Adventure Marshall Islands - Day 18
Tuesday, June 7
Today was kind of due to be a lazy day, and it turned into one pretty quickly. It happened that the TV was on for part of the morning, and MTV happened to be one of the channels flipped to. This made me decide that the day's theme song would be Bruno Mars' Lazy Day which is a rather repetitive ditty, most memorable by the whistling in the chorus as well as the back-up dancing done by guys in chimpanzee masks. Nonetheless, today I don't feel like doing anything, which is the main message from the song.
We had the idea to try to get to the wellness center for their potentially healthier and definitely cheaper banana pancakes, but Claire wanted bacon also. It turns out the other mother did as well, as she said so when we stopped by to tell her of our decision to just go downstairs. I opted for the apple and cinnamon pancakes instead,though, with the Portuguese sausage. We had a nice breakfast, and spent just a little time outside before returning to the room.
At breakfast I reminded myself that today is Tuesday, and that I did have a task to get to for my client. I thought maybe before I got too distracted doing nothing that I should be able to get some of that done. Claire had thought she might like to do a little beadwork, making a few gifts for some of the gals who've helped us with our stay. Also, we needed to do laundry, and we wanted to take advantage of our new knowledge of quarter-run machines here at the hotel.
Grace was sleeping, as normal, so Claire set out to the hardware store for a refill of our water bottle, some laundry soap, and a laundry basket. Since we couldn't find any kind of bag, it seemed like the best solution. Hopefully its solid-enough base would be solid enough to discourage any critters from wanting to check out our sweaty laundry. She returned pretty quickly, gathered our dirties, and set out to wash and dry what she could.
I settled in beside Grace on the sofa. She was sleeping, and as I sunk into the cushion next to her, Mac propped on my knees, I tried to turn on developer mode. The sofa is not suitable for such work, but I wanted to be closer to Grace in case she stirred, or in case she spontaneously learned how to roll over, and tried to roll off the sofa. It's an old sleeper-sofa, and the center of it is not fit for a person half my size; nearly everyone that sits on it, except Grace, sinks in to what seems a less than comfortable hole. However, the pair of solid chairs we have aren't any more comfortable, and the desk, while convenient, isn't particularly well-suited for long-term work on a PC.
I had previously made a little script to swipe the HTML from the current site. There are a couple different types of pages, one being filled with text, the other just a list of external links. My spider script grabbed all of them by article number (such as the URLs allow), and grabbed the aggregating pages, so I could see if the short title with the summary was different than the title on the pages. I had run the script on my PC at home, where bandwidth isn't an issue, both in speed and cost per minute. I set it to run and had disconnected my shell session. The script had completed without a problem, giving me a few thousand HTML files in a few directories to work with.
I made an archive file of these HTML page and thought to download them to the Mac for working on here. Unfortunately, the archive is still 14M huge! That'll take more than an hour to download at the speeds offered here. I grabbed a few of the pages, enough so I'd be able to work off-line to create a script or application to parse the files and create another containing all of the data in a format that can be used to re-enter the data into the new content system when I'm done.
I thought also to check in on the client's e-mail system to both give an update on this task, an also see if there's more, but, despite being the same password I've used there for months, I managed to type it wrong three times and evidently lock myself out. Again. I try once, knowing when I should doubt my keystrokes and try again, and when I do, I do the whole password again. I made no mistakes the first time, but failed anyway. I tried more slowly and carefully, speaking the letters as I typed, and again failed. I tried even slower, with one hand, watching as I hit the keys, and again failed.
I shut down the Internet connection, having spent about an hour doing what I casually call “nothing,” since it resulted in me creating a giant file I can't use and grabbing a handful of small files. Oh, and failing to check my e-mail. Still, I'm going to bill them, because it's their goofy security that locks me out, even when I know I'm right.
It does make me wonder, though, if someone else is accidentally putting in my user ID when they're trying to do something, or if there's not some kind of goofy automated process or saved password somewhere. I have the only other machine I've used with my account in my possession, so that shouldn't be happening. The second, that is. Someone else typing wrong can always happen. I've had situations where things like my IDE or some app like IM or e-mail even will try to log in on my behalf with a bad password, before I get a chance to update it. I don't think that's happening here. Given my comfort typing, my care when I'm wrong, and my extreme care when I give it the third try, I'm sure it isn't me. Maybe there's something in the middle that loses bytes. Maybe that's why the VPN failed.
I gave up, thinking to take a break and finish working on the script after I got over being rejected by a mail or web server. I set to catching up on my blog posts, which had again become a few days behind actual happenings. I'm very glad that I've been making little notes in the LibreOffice document I use to write off-line, or I'd surely forget everything that happens while we're here.
Claire returned with a finished load of laundry. She gave me the lowdown of the laundry room situation, which is one each, washer and dryer, in a little unvented room. The room also happens to be across the hallway from Uncle Sam's room, the guy we met earlier in the restaurant. He'd offered her a chair, which the room did not have, but she declined, not wanting to commit him to waiting for her to finish so she could return the chair. She also said another woman kept peeking in on her, but despite being told that Claire was done using the washer, the woman didn't want to share the room. I jokingly suggested maybe she was just checking so she could swipe abandoned clothes. Of course, that wasn't the case, as Claire returned later with the remaining dry clothes.
Grace had slept pretty much the whole afternoon. I had her up for a little while, listening to some iTunes, and telling her about the bands or songs that were playing. She took her even-hour bottle (some days she drinks on the odd hours, today, even hours) and fell back asleep, so each time Claire came in, Grace was unconscious. Claire put her clothes away, and folded mine and left them stacked on the bed. She came out and took a just awake Grace and played with her a little bit.
While we were hanging out, a persistent knocking came to the door. It's happened a couple times now. A skinny girl, maybe pre- or early-teen is out there with a friendly smile. She introduces herself, so she's not a stranger, and then hits you up for a couple of bucks. I'm not against giving a little help, and I feel for her, as she may well be in need, but I don't want to start a habit of giving out money to people who knock on our door. We don't do it at home, even for really good sounding causes, either. Yeah, I guess we're that kind of person. I'm so much that kind of person that I want to make a little bit of a fuss to the hotel staff and try to get them to stop it so I don't have to tell the girl to go away.
We got a visit from the other adopting mother, who said (among other things we chatted about) she had asked about the missing movie channel at the front desk. They informed her the channel had changed, but when we checked the channel they told her, it wasn't the movie channel, but was like CBS or something that had always been there. She disappointedly returned to her room. Not too long later she called to ask if we were interested in going to dinner at the Stonehouse. We said “yes.” We contacted the other family, and they (after retrieving their phone from their rental) also said “yes.” We all agreed to set out about 6PM.
While we waited for dinnertime to arrive, we got a text message from Claudia, of the CAA. She was checking to see if Thursday or Saturday was better for a visit with our birthmother. We've been looking forward to trying to get together with her, but also we've been trying to pass the time, and have made plans for Thursday to take a day cruise to one of the other islands. As with the other island and park things we've done, we're not really sure what the deal is, or what to expect, or how it would work or if it would set a trend if we invited our birthmother and her kids along, so we suggested instead that we go to Laura (I've been misspelling that, I've learned) Beach on Saturday, if that worked for everyone. Eventually a text came back and said Saturday at the beach sounded good.
We waited outside our hotel for a while, and got a call they were a little late. We took off to meet them there, since they knew where it was. They pulled in behind us just as we parked. We milled about in the well-manicured yard for a bit, taking a few snapshots, and catching up on the last couple days.
The family from the other hotel has had a little adventure as their boy seems to have caught something during the beach day. A visit to the hospital, and some medicine later, and his fever has gone down and he feels much better. We're feeling pretty good that Grace has had only a little bit of a phlegmy cough early on, and that has passed. We're a little nervous, as any parents are, that we'll be next with some life-threatening bug bite or something just as seemingly harmless.
While we were milling, we learned that the other dad and boy were going to stay for a while longer. They had thought to leave this Friday, as that was the date of their originally purchased tickets, but when asked, mom said she'd prefer they stay, so they're staying. So they'll be around to do the beach again on Sunday, which everyone is looking forward to. It'll help me, too, as other dad agreed that we could go in on a handful of cases of beer and soda and rum, spreading out some of the cost. Everything is sold by the can here, and beer is about $2 a can, and soda just less than a buck. Getting a few cases of beer and one of soda is going to run about $100!
We went in and ordered. The place is pretty small, having maybe a half-dozen four-top tables crammed into one tight-fitting room. There were people at two of the other tables. The kind lady brought us menus, and left us to go over it. The menu was really two pages long, but following the two pages that listed the items and their prices was about ten more pages of pictures of the items. Small, hard to make out pictures, but enough to get a hint at what everything was. We ordered a round of iced tea and waters, and then ordered entrees.
It was a little stifling in the room. Not quite hot, but there was very little airflow, and the temperature, while cooler than outside, was a little warmer than comfortable. The littler kids got a little cranky and needed a little time outside, but then settled in while everyone ate. We had a little adventure with a spilled glass of iced tea, too. Otherwise, dinner was uneventful and the food was fine. I'm not big into Japanese cuisine, and except for some of the hibachi stuff, which is mostly about the show anyway, “fine” is about as good as I've had. I had a dish with chicken and veggies over rice, and it was fine.
After everyone finished, we chatted by the cars for a bit. We're all planning on meeting at our hotel for lunch tomorrow. I fear a little bit, but it's a bit of (I hope) a friendly and casual meet with Andrew, from the embassy, and his wife, as they're regulars at the hotel's sushi buffet. I'm still no fan of Japanese cuisine, so it's doubtful I'll partake in any of the buffet.
I feel for both Andrew, as the face of the local embassy as he gets bombarded with inquiries about the visa processing, and the parents who want to know how everything is going so they call and ask him. The processing is happening in Manila, and after submitting it, he's out of the loop until it's sent back. I believe him when he says they check and try to stay informed of the visa requests' processing, but there's nothing he can do to make it happen faster. Again, we've only been here creeping on two weeks after our request has been submitted, so I'm no where near frantic to know.
Still, I'm looking forward to getting to know them a little bit. It never hurts just to be friendly and seen around. Heck, we've run into the judge who did the adoption a handful of times, we drank rum and hung out with some important folk at the beach, and I've got an invitation to meet the guy who's made three of the four Marshallese movies. I'm getting connected over here.
We returned home and guessed that we'd probably do breakfast in since Claire's planning on hanging out in the restaurant from late morning until after we get done hanging out with the embassy folk and other families. I'm planning on bringing the laptop, and maybe doing some work or something while we wait.
Grace, having slept off and on all evening, wasn't so tired when we settled in for a couple episodes of Modern Family, so she fussed on our laps while we watched one. Then she fell asleep in her bed, and we watched our second for the night.